An increasingly significant focus for many businesses, worldwide Master Data Management software revenue will reach $1.9 billion in 2012, an increase of 21 percent from 2011, according to a recent report from IT research firm Gartner.

“Master Data Management is a priority for IT and business leaders as a result of various pressures, including the urgent need to improve business process outcomes and improve decision-making capabilities” said Erik Lindholm, Head of Product Management at Syncron. “We are delighted to continue our strong and successful partnership with Alfa Laval.”

The eCommerce initiative is designed to improve the effectiveness of the business’ order management processes through establishing new order entry systems across its operations. With each order entry system requiring access to the same accurate and timely product information, Alfa Laval recognized the need to reconcile product item data that was stored across more than 30 different manufacturing and distribution center systems across the globe.

“Accurate and organized item master data is absolutely critical for us to drive forward our eCommerce initiative,” said Björn Wilhemsson, Master Data Governor at Alfa Laval. “Syncron had already proven to be a valuable solution partner to Alfa Laval which was one of the key reasons we selected the Syncron Global Item Master ahead of other solutions. Since the mid-2000’s, Alfa Laval has been successfully running Syncron’s Global Customer Master and Global Order Management solutions to support its operations. Other leading business using Syncron MDM solutions include the likes of Konecranes, Scania, Sandvik and Volvo CE.”

They approached Syncron for an MDM solution that could be implemented in a short timeframe and is able to handle its large data volumes in multiple formats to support various business systems including Movex and Jeeves, amongst others. Syncron Global Item Master provides a single repository of product information for Alfa Laval—it cleanses inaccurate and inconsistent data and identifies and resolves duplicate records. The solution acts as a central point to handle and enhance data and gives users the ability to extend their data model with dynamic attributes using an external, product taxonomy.